These Hands
by landslide-state-of-mind
Summary: "Chloe loved Aubrey's hands. It was almost weird how much she loved them." A short, fluffy drabble in which Chloe thinks about her girlfriend's hands.


Chloe Beale was watching her girlfriend closely. Aubrey wasn't doing anything specific to warrant the special attention, in fact she wasn't even aware that Chloe was watching her. She was working, of course, sitting on the floor and making notes about whatever legal case she was working on. She had her work stuff spread over the coffee table, and was writing rapidly, perfect cursive spilling across the legal pad. It wasn't the work Chloe was watching, it was Aubrey's hands.

Chloe loved Aubrey's hands. It was almost weird how much she loved them. Her hands were soft and strong simultaneously. Her fingers were long and slender and smooth. But what she loved most about Aubrey's fingers was how well they betrayed everything important about her. Like now, she was concentrating, and Chloe could tell by the even strokes of her hand that she was confident. She believed in whatever it was she was writing. When she looked up things in the thick bound volumes of law, Chloe would watch her fingertips skim across the pages, wondering if she was learning by osmosis, or maybe she was caressing the words, trying to physically love the profession that had made her so happy.

When she was anxious, they clutched at inconsequential things and held them tightly. Hems of shirts, napkins wrung into thin ropes and twisted around her fingers until they pinched her skin white and raw. Pencils. They soon snapped under the force of her anxiety and stress, to the point where during her bar exam prep Chloe was buying a pack of number twos a week. Also her hair, wound tightly around her own digits, pulling at her scalp until Chloe carefully untangled it all and kissed the fingers into submission before digging her own into Aubrey's hair to massage her head and soothe any tension, physical or mental.

When she was angry, they tapped. Over and over, manicured nails repeating a violent staccato against countertops, benches, desks, her own arm. It was a one hundred percent accurate signal that she was mad, and again Chloe was the one who could read into the signal and step in to help. First it would just be her own hand placed on top of Aubrey's, an interlacing of their fingers, and gentle circles dancing across the back of her hand courtesy of Chloe's thumb. The tapping would slow and eventually stop, Aubrey's fingers curling against Chloe's as a signal of their acquiescence.

Aubrey's hands and fingers were a marvel and Chloe was privy to the full extent of it. Almost nobody knew that Aubrey's fingers had endured twelve years of piano lessons. It was something she had always kept to herself until Chloe had found her playing complicated pieces, from memory no less, in the auditorium before Bellas one day. The blonde had confided that it was something that relaxed her. She knew where each finger needed to go, how hard to hit each key, and it was a simple solace to know that even when things were an absolute mess, there was still some measure of control she could have over something beautiful. She could create gorgeous things with those fingers, make beautiful sounds. When she played the upright piano in their home, Chloe would watch her the entire time, fascinated as the fingers flew across the keys.

And of course, Aubrey's hands spoke volumes about how she loved Chloe. Aubrey was a master of words. She had a reputation as an articulate, aggressive litigator and she could run verbal rings around opposing council. But when it came to telling Chloe how she felt, it was all in her hands. No argument Aubrey had ever delivered in any courtroom was nearly as telling as the way her hands touched Chloe. Aubrey's hand resting on Chloe's knee as she drove, or curling against the back of her neck as they danced. Fingertips softly pushing red hair from Chloe's face, thumb tracing Chloe's lips before they kissed. Fingers scrambling to interlace with hers as they went to sleep. A clutch of their hands together as they walked. A gentle hand rubbing soothing circles on her back under her shirt when Chloe was sick or upset.

And, of course, the backs of Aubrey's fingers caressing her cheek, or her practised fingers slowly dragging up her spine. The gentle slide of her fingertips under waistbands or up shirts, soft traces over sensitive skin, tender touches and firm strokes that made Chloe wonder if she was just some piece of music Aubrey had memorized years ago, because it felt like she knew exactly how to play her. And the way Aubrey used her hands to turn Chloe's face toward her, so that when she did say it out loud, "I love you, Chloe", she could see her eyes.

But Chloe's favorite thing about Aubrey's hands were when they were just sitting and watching TV or sometimes Aubrey was reading, and her fingers would absentmindedly trace patterns of nothing on her palm. Dancing secrets and promises across her skin, sometimes dipping down in between her fingers to touch the two gold rings she'd slid there on the two happiest days of Chloe's life. So even though Aubrey was working, Chloe took the pencil from her hand and intertwined their fingers. She gently tugged Aubrey up from her position on the floor, pressing her lips to the blonde's fingers, peppering them with kisses. Aubrey protested for maybe three seconds before she caved and used her hands to tell Chloe just how much she loved her.


End file.
